James Shelby Downard
James Shelby Downard (13 March 1913 – 16 March 1998anonymous; Obituaries, the Daily Ardmorite, 18 March 1998) was an American conspiracy theorist whose works, most of which have been published in various anthologies from Feral House, examined perceived occult symbolism, twilight language and synchronicity behind historical events in the 20th century. Vankin and Whalen write of Downard, Biography Downard is probably best known for his essay “King-Kill/33: Masonic Symbolism in the Assassination of John F. Kennedy”, originally published by Adam Parfrey in the first edition of the book Apocalypse Culture, which speculates that the Freemasons were responsible for the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The essay was removed from the second edition of the book and replaced by another essay by Downard, “The Call to Chaos”. Apocalypse Culture II contains another Downard essay, “America, The Possessed Corpse”. Jim Keith, editor of yet another Feral House publication, Secret and Suppressed: Banned Ideas and Hidden History, included “Sorcery, Sex, Assassination”, the original article of which King Kill/33 is an abridgement. Included in Cult Rapture is “Riding the Downardian Nightmare”, a piece written by Parfrey concerning a visit to Downard in Memphis, Tennessee. Friend and mentor to researcher Michael A. Hoffman II, author of Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare, Downard's influence is evident in Hoffman's work. Hoffman's website released the full manuscript of “King Kill/33” and “Carnivals of Life and Death”. Downard was assisted in many of his earlier works by his good friend, William N. Grimstad. Grimstad is better known as Jim Brandon, author of the Fortean classics, Weird America: A Guide to Places of Mystery in the United States and The Rebirth of Pan: Hidden Faces of the American Earth Spirit. In the early 1970s he was assisted in his writing and editing by John and Darlene Cox in Lake Havasu; then, later in the early 1980s he resided with John and Karen Bissell in Estacada, Oregon where Karen typed his manuscripts and John assisted with research. It is in "Weird America" that we find this entry by Grimstad (as Jim Brandon) for the Dallas - FT. Worth Area; the first published piece on Downard's theory: Downard died in 1998 while working on his autobiography, the first volume of which, The Carnivals of Life and Death, was published in 2006 and deals with his childhood in the Deep South, where he was first exposed to the Freemasons and Ku Klux Klan. Downard's body of work has gained a sizeable cult following. References *Weird America people: A Guide to being normal. Places of Mystery in the United States, Brandon, Jim. New York, NY.: E. P. Dutton, 1978.3 Sources *Brandon, Jim, Weird America: A Guide to Places of Mystery in the United States, New York, NY.: E. P. Dutton, 1978.3 *Brandon, Jim. Dunlap, Ill. The Rebirth of Pan: Hidden Faces of the American Earth Spirit, Firebird Press, 1983. *Downard, James Shelby, The Carnivals of Life and Death, Feral House, September 2006. *Gorightly, Adam; James Shelby Downard's Mystical War, Virtualbookworm.com Publishing, November 2008. *Hoffman II, Michael A., Secret Societies and Psychological Warfare, Coeur d'Alene, Idaho.: Independent History and Research, 2001. *Jonathan Vankin and John Whalen, The 70 Greatest Conspiracies of All Time (Citadel Press, 2001) ISBN 0-8065-2033-7 *“Sorcery, Sex, Assassination”, in Keith, Jim ed. Secret and Suppressed. Portland, Or.: Feral House, 1993. *“America, The Possessed Corpse”, in Parfrey, Adam ed. Apocalypse Culture II. Venice, Calif.: Feral House, 2000. *“Riding the Downardian Nighmare”, in Parfrey, Adam. Cult Rapture. Portland, Or.: Feral House, 1994. External links *King-Kill/33 - Masonic Symbolism in the assassination of John F. Kennedy Category:1913 births Category:1998 deaths Category:Conspiracy theorists Category:Anti-Masonry Category:People associated with the John F. Kennedy assassination es:James Shelby Downard fr:James Shelby Downard